The best evidence for Creationism

[mathetes123]

Answer the question or admit you misspoke. When you make a claim, you need to back it up. Quit trying to deflect the tough questions.

All of evolution (macro-evolution) requires faith because it is not testable. You cannot go back in time and observe the evolution of a single cell organism all the way to a human being. It requires faith to believe such a transition could have occured.

 

[Mr Strawberry]

Do tell. What is the conclusive evidence for evolution. Specifics, please.

I saw this in another thread yesterday, I can't remember if it was you or not, mathetes, but how do creationists not know the evidence for evolution? Is it hidden from them? Is google disabled on their computers? Are there creationist police who check on a daily basis that they aren't exposed to any scientific literature? Or have they just been told over and over again that there isn't any evidence for evolution and it's all a massive hoax/conspiracy/evil plot by Dr Nasty/work of the devil/something equally barmy on a global scale in order to...to...well, who knows what the point is supposed to be.

It must be one of the above or there wouldn't be a constant stream of these poor bewildered devils parroting this fatuous mantra.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Do tell. What is the conclusive evidence for evolution. Specifics, please.

My personal favourites, in no particular order, are:

1. Twin-nested hierarchy - the ability to place organisms into hierarchical taxonomy based on a feature (such as anatomy), and into another hierarchy based on another feature (such as a protein), and those two hierarchies are always the same, as evolution requires.
2. DNA - when Darwin first proposed his theory, he simply posited the existence of some biological mechanism that allowed for variable inheritance. The discovery of DNA, mutations, and the whole field of genetics, validates that fundamental prediction.
3. Macroevolution - there are many observed instances of species evolving brand-new features. The best example is Lemski's 20-year-long study of E. coli, which, over 44,000 generations, evolved the new ability to ingest citric acid directly from its environs, rather than synthesising it internally - a useful feature not seen in E. coli. We also see species of bacteria that can ingest nylon - a synthetic material.
4. Speciation - as evolution requires, species speciate when genetically isolated. Not only can this be readily induced in the lab (fruit flies being a common example*), it's seen to occur naturally in the wild, and there are striking examples in the form of rings species, all operating exactly as evolution requires.
5. Homology - species exhibit the same anatomical features as you would expect with common ancestry. The bones in the human hand mirror those in apes, cetaceans, birds, etc, with dissimilarity directly corresponding to their 'distance' on the tree of life.
6. Vestigial features - not all features are eternally useful, and so we expect organisms to have features of limited use, but which bear the hallmarks of their ancestors. The quintessential examples are in the cetaceans: they breath air through lungs, they move via caudal oscillation (the tail and spine goes up and down, echoing their terrestrial quadrupedal ancestors, not side to side, like water-breathing fish), they have a pelvis and hindlimbs, they birth live, air-breathing offspring, etc.

Those are off the top of my head.

*Yes, they're still flies. No, evolution doesn't say they should turn into anything else.

 

[mathetes123]

I saw this in another thread yesterday, I can't remember if it was you or not, mathetes, but how do creationists not know the evidence for evolution? Is it hidden from them? Is google disabled on their computers? Are there creationist police who check on a daily basis that they aren't exposed to any scientific literature? Or have they just been told over and over again that there isn't any evidence for evolution and it's all a massive hoax/conspiracy/evil plot by Dr Nasty/work of the devil/something equally barmy on a global scale in order to...to...well, who knows what the point is supposed to be.

It must be one of the above or there wouldn't be a constant stream of these poor bewildered devils parroting this fatuous mantra.

This is the typical response I hear from evolutionists. They make appeals to all the so called irrefutable proof for evolution, but cannot expound on that proof themselves. They have accepted on faith that evolution is true because they have been taught it is true from 12 years of indoctrination in government schools.

 

[Wiccan_Child]

All of evolution (macro-evolution) requires faith because it is not testable. You cannot go back in time and observe the evolution of a single cell organism all the way to a human being. It requires faith to believe such a transition could have occured.

I disagree. By that logic, we can never know anything about the past, as we can't go back in time. But, of course, that's not the case, as the past leaves relics. Forensics exists because we can deduce what happened in the past through careful analysis and experimentation of the evidence. Likewise, there's no fundamental reason why we can't do the same with the distance past. Relics such as fossils, the geologic column, the moving seabed, ice core samples, dendochronology, radiometric dating, etc, all allow us to deduce what happened in the past.

You're right that we can't go back in time and directly observe with our own eyeballs, but you're wrong in that that's an obstacle.

 

[mkatzwork]

Do tell. What is the conclusive evidence for evolution. Specifics, please.

Clever - inserting the word 'conclusive' so you have a readily movable goalpost. But - not so clever as it was pretty obvious.

When we point out the evidence doesn't neatly fit on an internet forum (it's actually pretty vast, one of the defining characteristics of the evidence for a solid theory) - you'll say something along the lines of "find me the best piece of evidence" as if evidence is graded out of 10 and anybody would be dumb enough to put up just one piece of evidence so you can throw straw at it.

It's as if you don't think we've seen such Hovind-y tactics before.

maybe start* here so you know what the theory actually says as opposed to what you just think it says or more likely what you've been told it says...this theory actually derives FROM the observed evidence, it wasn't an idea that just popped into his head that he set out to prove dogmatically.

The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin

then:

Human Evolution Evidence | The Smithsonian Institution's Human Origins Program

What is the evidence for evolution?

then maybe the 33,000 odd papers in Nature alone mentioning evolution, including some of the latest work, the most recent of which was published yesterday.

*this is the point where you started going "la la la la la not listening", in case you were wondering, since you don't actually want to see the evidence for evolution, do you? I assure you, those pages are the tip of an enormous iceberg - huge. That said, the Bible is probably more your thing. It's short, by comparison, and a lot cuddlier, and doesn't require critical thought and reasoning to accept it, which is your problem with science. It's not easy, it's not cuddly - but alas, it has a great many theories that explain the world rather well.

 

[mathetes123]

My personal favourites, in no particular order, are:

1. Twin-nested hierarchy - the ability to place organisms into hierarchical taxonomy based on a feature (such as anatomy), and into another hierarchy based on another feature (such as a protein), and those two hierarchies are always the same, as evolution requires. This could just as easily be evidence of a common designer. Automobiles of one manufacturer share common parts for different models. The thing they have in commmon is the same manufacturer.
2. DNA - when Darwin first proposed his theory, he simply posited the existence of some biological mechanism that allowed for variable inheritance. The discovery of DNA, mutations, and the whole field of genetics, validates that fundamental prediction. DNA is information. Only intelligence creates information.
3. Macroevolution - there are many observed instances of species evolving brand-new features. The best example is Lemski's 20-year-long study of E. coli, which, over 44,000 generations, evolved the new ability to ingest citric acid directly from its environs, rather than synthesising it internally - a useful feature not seen in E. coli. We also see species of bacteria that can ingest nylon - a synthetic material. The bacteria remains a bacteria. Species are man made classifications. God created all animals in created kinds. One created kind did not evolve from another. They were all created in the six days of creation just as scripture says.
4. Speciation - as evolution requires, species speciate when genetically isolated. Not only can this be readily induced in the lab (fruit flies being a common example*), it's seen to occur naturally in the wild, and there are striking examples in the form of rings species, all operating exactly as evolution requires. See response to item 3. The fruit fly remains a fruit fly.
5. Homology - species exhibit the same anatomical features as you would expect with common ancestry. The bones in the human hand mirror those in apes, cetaceans, birds, etc, with dissimilarity directly corresponding to their 'distance' on the tree of life. See response to item 1. This is just as easily evidence of a common designer.
6. Vestigial features - not all features are eternally useful, and so we expect organisms to have features of limited use, but which bear the hallmarks of their ancestors. The quintessential examples are in the cetaceans: they breath air through lungs, they move via caudal oscillation (the tail and spine goes up and down, echoing their terrestrial quadrupedal ancestors, not side to side, like water-breathing fish), they have a pelvis and hindlimbs, they birth live, air-breathing offspring, etc. Where is the mass of transitional fossils we would expect to see. Why are there distinct kinds of animals in existence today and not animals in a transitional phase between two types.

Those are off the top of my head.

*Yes, they're still flies. No, evolution doesn't say they should turn into anything else.

See comments in red above.

 

[mathetes123]

I disagree. By that logic, we can never know anything about the past, as we can't go back in time. But, of course, that's not the case, as the past leaves relics. Forensics exists because we can deduce what happened in the past through careful analysis and experimentation of the evidence. Likewise, there's no fundamental reason why we can't do the same with the distance past. Relics such as fossils, the geologic column, the moving seabed, ice core samples, dendochronology, radiometric dating, etc, all allow us to deduce what happened in the past.

You're right that we can't go back in time and directly observe with our own eyeballs, but you're wrong in that that's an obstacle.

If scientists were to find chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea, would you consider that evidence of the Exodus?

 

[mkatzwork]

All of evolution (macro-evolution) requires faith because it is not testable. You cannot go back in time and observe the evolution of a single cell organism all the way to a human being. It requires faith to believe such a transition could have occured.

You cannot go back in time and observe your parent's birth, but I doubt you take your own existence on "faith" alone, or their existence. But how do you know they exist? Well - you see them (assuming they're still alive, please forgive if that's not the case), you can touch them, you can talk to them, you can observe them. You are looking at the evidence and drawing a very safe conclusion, but nonetheless, the process is the same. In fact, there's only one place where theists use faith, and that's in the question of the Almighty. In every other aspect of your life, using faith to do anything would be ridiculous - you use observation and draw conclusions from your environment - unless you drive a car blindfolded.

So, your argument is, in the immortal words of Monty Python - silly.

Incidentally, I don't know where you heard that evolution is untestable. It's thoroughly testable. A positive test result is just an observation that was predicted by the hypothesis.

One of the predictions of the claim that humans and chimps evolved from a common ancestor (that term is terrible, but just for the sake of argument) was to look for signs of chromosomal fusion, since they have 2 more than we do. The predicted observation was verified. That was a pretty precise prediction.

So evolution passed that test (a tough one to pass). It continues to pass them to this day.

Speciation - what the very fuzzy and misused term "macroevolution" is really getting at - has been observed. Macroevolution is any change in the species level and above. Then you decide to counter this by redefining what a 'species' is, and that's when people starting laughing at you as opposed to with you.

JSTOR: Evolution, Vol. 47, No. 6 (Dec., 1993), pp. 1637-1653

End of story.

 

[mkatzwork]

If scientists were to find chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea, would you consider that evidence of the Exodus?

It might be, it might not be. That would depend enormously on a) actually finding them there b) being demonstrably the right kind and right age, and c) them having not been dumped there by someone acting fraudulently or by another event. Chariots were taken on boats, and boats did SINK occasionally, so it would be tough to then paint it as convincing evidence to beyond reasonable doubt, even if they were found.

The claim would be extraordinary, so it would have to be verified by other researchers, not just an amateur archaeologist named Ron who also claimed to have found Noah's Ark, The Tower of Babel, the site of Mount Sinai, the Ark of the Covenant, and more.

All he had was pictures of some underwater chariot wheels, except that nobody was ever able to find them, verify them, test them. Of course, all other evidence that was supposedly there is now "gone", and the wheel found is now missing. Even the guy's wife was skeptical.

Incidentally, isn't it a weak "faith" that requires or goes looking for archaeological evidence? I thought the whole point was you were happy to accept this stuff despite the complete absence of evidence.......sounds more like you are testing hypotheses to me. Heretics!

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Twin-nested hierarchy - the ability to place organisms into hierarchical taxonomy based on a feature (such as anatomy), and into another hierarchy based on another feature (such as a protein), and those two hierarchies are always the same, as evolution requires.

This could just as easily be evidence of a common designer. Automobiles of one manufacturer share common parts for different models. The thing they have in commmon is the same manufacturer.

Irrelevant: the fact remains that this twin-nested hierarchy constitutes very good evidence indeed for evolution. The fact that no organism sits outside taxonomy, the fact that you can take any feature or protein and generate the same hierarchy each time, is exactly what evolution predicts, and must be true for evolution to be true. Thus, it proves, beyond all reasonable doubt, the truth of evolution, as per your request.

By contrast, if evolution wasn't true, there'd be no reason to suppose that this hierarchy would exist. A common designer may well reuse old designs, but that raises a number of questions: why reuse designs, when the omniscient being can create entirely new features? Why reuse designs in such a way that it creates a taxonomic system, where only mammals and all mammals have hair, middle ear bones, etc? Why stick rigidly to this system, even when it causes serious harm to the host (for example, the placement of the windpipe and foodpipe in the neck make choking an unnecessarily likely hazard; why? Why make aquatic creatures but give them lungs instead of gills? Etc).

It's an example of ad hoc reasoning to fit twin-nested hierarchy into Creationism. Yes, it doesn't disprove Creationism (and I never said it was, only that it provided scientific proof of evolution), but it is very contrived in the Creationist model, while it has a concrete and well-understood origin under the evolutionist model.

In other words, no, it's not evidence of a common designer, as there is no reasoning that leads one to predict a twin-nested hierarchy under Creationism. By contrast, this is perfectly predicted under evolution.

DNA - when Darwin first proposed his theory, he simply posited the existence of some biological mechanism that allowed for variable inheritance. The discovery of DNA, mutations, and the whole field of genetics, validates that fundamental prediction.

DNA is information. Only intelligence creates information.

This is, again, irrelevant. Even if only an intelligence could have created DNA (and I'll explain in a moment why that isn't the case), the fact remains that the existence of DNA, as well as the way it behaves, completely fulfils the prediction made by Darwin in the early days of evolution, that there be some inherent, biological mechanism for variable inheritance.

It could easily have been that there is no mechanism, thus disproving evolution forever. But, instead, the sheer existence of DNA, and not to mention the discoveries made within the field of genetics, do constitute evidence beyond all reasonable doubt for evolution - as per your request.

Macroevolution - there are many observed instances of species evolving brand-new features. The best example is Lemski's 20-year-long study of E. coli, which, over 44,000 generations, evolved the new ability to ingest citric acid directly from its environs, rather than synthesising it internally - a useful feature not seen in E. coli. We also see species of bacteria that can ingest nylon - a synthetic material.

The bacteria remains a bacteria. Species are man made classifications. God created all animals in created kinds. One created kind did not evolve from another. They were all created in the six days of creation just as scripture says.

I don't quite know what to make of your reply. You haven't addressed any of my points regarding macroevolution, you've just spoken at me, not to me, so there's no a lot I can say, because you haven't said anything to refute my point - do you, therefore, accept it?

"The bacteria [sic] remains a bacteria [sic]" - correct. I don't know what to make of this. Are you suggesting that they shouldn't be?

"Species are man made classifications" - correct, but they have a basis in objective reality. The word 'star' is a man-made classification, but stars do exist.

"God created all animals in created kinds. One created kind did not evolve from another. They were all created in the six days of creation just as scripture says." - allegedly, but what's your point? What relevance does this have to my point?

Speciation - as evolution requires, species speciate when genetically isolated. Not only can this be readily induced in the lab (fruit flies being a common example*), it's seen to occur naturally in the wild, and there are striking examples in the form of rings species, all operating exactly as evolution requires.

See response to item 3. The fruit fly remains a fruit fly.

Yes, and you'll notice that this reply is so common, so predictable, that I coutnered it before you even made it. You say that the fruit fly remains a fruit fly. That is absolutely correct, a valid and true observation if ever there was one. But I'm stymied as to its relevance - are you suggesting that the fruit fly become something else? If so, why? Do you believe that's what evolution requires?

Homology - species exhibit the same anatomical features as you would expect with common ancestry. The bones in the human hand mirror those in apes, cetaceans, birds, etc, with dissimilarity directly corresponding to their 'distance' on the tree of life.

See response to item 1. This is just as easily evidence of a common designer.

Your reply is equally irrelevant: regardless of whether or not homology constitutes evidence for a common designer (it doesn't; see above), it still constitutes evidence for evolution, as per your request.

Vestigial features - not all features are eternally useful, and so we expect organisms to have features of limited use, but which bear the hallmarks of their ancestors. The quintessential examples are in the cetaceans: they breath air through lungs, they move via caudal oscillation (the tail and spine goes up and down, echoing their terrestrial quadrupedal ancestors, not side to side, like water-breathing fish), they have a pelvis and hindlimbs, they birth live, air-breathing offspring, etc.

Where is the mass of transitional fossils we would expect to see. Why are there distinct kinds of animals in existence today and not animals in a transitional phase between two types.

First, none of these questions have any relevance to my point. Does that mean you accept vestigial features, such as those found on cetaceans, to be evidence for evolution?

Second, your questions bely a misunderstanding of what we expect to find should evolution be true. The notion of a 'transitional' form implies some sort of foresight to evolution, that species evolve towards some other form - they don't. In essence, every organism, every fossil, is a transition between its mother and its daughter. The first terrestrial species, the first avian species, etc, can be cited as 'transitional' species, but that still misses the point.

Anyway. "Where are the fossils?" They're everywhere. We have literally millions of them, stored in every museum, either on display or in racks of drawers.

"Why are there distinct kinds of animals?" The simple answer is, there's not. Species don't exist in isolation, we see species exist as a blend as we go along the tree of life. In the case of ring species, we can see this geographically, rather than temporally. E. eschscholtzii are salamanders that live around a mountain, and where the 19 populations can breed with their neighbours - but the two at the far ends can't breed with each other. This is what evolution predicts, but the only explanation in Creationism is ad hoc and contrived.

We see 'transitional' species in the form of gliding snakes and squirrels - species undergoing the same process ancient reptiles did as they developed true flight. Each step being an improvement on the last, until one feature (gliding) develops into another (flight).

 

[Wiccan_Child]

If scientists were to find chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea, would you consider that evidence of the Exodus?

Yes, with the caveat that there are other, potentially more plausible explanations for chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea. The story of Exodus requires that such wheels be there, so finding them would indeed be evidence for the story. Not conclusive evidence, mind you, but evidence nonetheless.

 

[Mr Strawberry]

This is the typical response I hear from evolutionists. They make appeals to all the so called irrefutable proof for evolution, but cannot expound on that proof themselves. They have accepted on faith that evolution is true because they have been taught it is true from 12 years of indoctrination in government schools.

Science doesn't do proofs, it does evidence and theories based on the evidence. The theories are then tested to see if the results of the test support or undermine the theory. If the new evidence from the test doesn't fit the theory then the theory is either scrapped or altered: the improved theory fits more evidence. After 150 years no one has managed to to find evidence that doesn't fit the theory of evolution. That is why we say that an anomaly like rabbits in the Cambrian would be a problem. It wouldn't fit the theory. Everything we know fits the theory. If something didn't it would be big news.

Science doesn't do faith either. Faith is belief without evidence. Science is, by definition, about evidence. Were you ever asked to do an experiment in science class? Were you encouraged to do your own research and projects to test scientific theories in science class? Or did they ask you to close your eyes and pray really hard for the strength to believe in what was being taught, because if you didn't believe it you would go to hell and suffer unimaginable terror and agony for all eternity?

Which approach sounds more like indoctrination to you?

 

[mathetes123]

Science doesn't do proofs, it does evidence and theories based on the evidence. The theories are then tested to see if the results of the test support or undermine the theory. If the new evidence from the test doesn't fit the theory then the theory is either scrapped or altered: the improved theory fits more evidence. After 150 years no one has managed to to find evidence that doesn't fit the theory of evolution. That is why we say that an anomaly like rabbits in the Cambrian would be a problem. It wouldn't fit the theory. Everything we know fits the theory. If something didn't it would be big news.

Science doesn't do faith either. Faith is belief without evidence. Science is, by definition, about evidence. Were you ever asked to do an experiment in science class? Were you encouraged to do your own research and projects to test scientific theories in science class? Or did they ask you to close your eyes and pray really hard for the strength to believe in what was being taught, because if you didn't believe it you would go to hell and suffer unimaginable terror and agony for all eternity?

Which approach sounds more like indoctrination to you?

You talk a lot about evidence, but don't expound on this evidence. What is the irrefutable proof for evolution.

 

[Davian]

Read genesis.

It doesn't say how. Have you read it?

 

[mathetes123]

It doesn't say how. Have you read it?

Sure it does:

Gen 1:1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Gen 1:2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
Gen 1:3 And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.
Gen 1:4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.
Gen 1:5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
Gen 1:6 And God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters."
Gen 1:7 And God made the expanse and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse. And it was so.
Gen 1:8 And God called the expanse Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
Gen 1:9 And God said, "Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear." And it was so.
Gen 1:10 God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:11 And God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth." And it was so.
Gen 1:12 The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:13 And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.
Gen 1:14 And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years,
Gen 1:15 and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth." And it was so.
Gen 1:16 And God made the two great lights--the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night--and the stars.
Gen 1:17 And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth,
Gen 1:18 to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
Gen 1:20 And God said, "Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens."
Gen 1:21 So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:22 And God blessed them, saying, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth."
Gen 1:23 And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
Gen 1:24 And God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds--livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds." And it was so.
Gen 1:25 And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Gen 1:26 Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
Gen 1:28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
Gen 1:29 And God said, "Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.
Gen 1:30 And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And it was so.
Gen 1:31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

 

[Mr Strawberry]

You talk a lot about evidence, but don't expound on this evidence. What is the irrefutable proof for evolution.

Lol, do you have reading comprehension problems, or do you just not read replies?

 

[mkatzwork]

You talk a lot about evidence, but don't expound on this evidence. What is the irrefutable proof for evolution.

If there was 'irrefutable proof' for evolution, this forum would obviously not exist. It would be absurd if there was and it did.

Science does not and never will claim irrefutable proofs - belief in inerrancy irrespective of data is the stuff of religion alone.

 

[Astridhere]

Irrelevant: the fact remains that this twin-nested hierarchy constitutes very good evidence indeed for evolution. The fact that no organism sits outside taxonomy, the fact that you can take any feature or protein and generate the same hierarchy each time, is exactly what evolution predicts, and must be true for evolution to be true. Thus, it proves, beyond all reasonable doubt, the truth of evolution, as per your request.

By contrast, if evolution wasn't true, there'd be no reason to suppose that this hierarchy would exist. A common designer may well reuse old designs, but that raises a number of questions: why reuse designs, when the omniscient being can create entirely new features? Why reuse designs in such a way that it creates a taxonomic system, where only mammals and all mammals have hair, middle ear bones, etc? Why stick rigidly to this system, even when it causes serious harm to the host (for example, the placement of the windpipe and foodpipe in the neck make choking an unnecessarily likely hazard; why? Why make aquatic creatures but give them lungs instead of gills? Etc).

It's an example of ad hoc reasoning to fit twin-nested hierarchy into Creationism. Yes, it doesn't disprove Creationism (and I never said it was, only that it provided scientific proof of evolution), but it is very contrived in the Creationist model, while it has a concrete and well-understood origin under the evolutionist model.

In other words, no, it's not evidence of a common designer, as there is no reasoning that leads one to predict a twin-nested hierarchy under Creationism. By contrast, this is perfectly predicted under evolution.


This is, again, irrelevant. Even if only an intelligence could have created DNA (and I'll explain in a moment why that isn't the case), the fact remains that the existence of DNA, as well as the way it behaves, completely fulfils the prediction made by Darwin in the early days of evolution, that there be some inherent, biological mechanism for variable inheritance.

It could easily have been that there is no mechanism, thus disproving evolution forever. But, instead, the sheer existence of DNA, and not to mention the discoveries made within the field of genetics, do constitute evidence beyond all reasonable doubt for evolution - as per your request.


I don't quite know what to make of your reply. You haven't addressed any of my points regarding macroevolution, you've just spoken at me, not to me, so there's no a lot I can say, because you haven't said anything to refute my point - do you, therefore, accept it?

"The bacteria [sic] remains a bacteria [sic]" - correct. I don't know what to make of this. Are you suggesting that they shouldn't be?

"Species are man made classifications" - correct, but they have a basis in objective reality. The word 'star' is a man-made classification, but stars do exist.

"God created all animals in created kinds. One created kind did not evolve from another. They were all created in the six days of creation just as scripture says." - allegedly, but what's your point? What relevance does this have to my point?

Yes, and you'll notice that this reply is so common, so predictable, that I coutnered it before you even made it. You say that the fruit fly remains a fruit fly. That is absolutely correct, a valid and true observation if ever there was one. But I'm stymied as to its relevance - are you suggesting that the fruit fly become something else? If so, why? Do you believe that's what evolution requires?


Your reply is equally irrelevant: regardless of whether or not homology constitutes evidence for a common designer (it doesn't; see above), it still constitutes evidence for evolution, as per your request.


First, none of these questions have any relevance to my point. Does that mean you accept vestigial features, such as those found on cetaceans, to be evidence for evolution?

Second, your questions bely a misunderstanding of what we expect to find should evolution be true. The notion of a 'transitional' form implies some sort of foresight to evolution, that species evolve towards some other form - they don't. In essence, every organism, every fossil, is a transition between its mother and its daughter. The first terrestrial species, the first avian species, etc, can be cited as 'transitional' species, but that still misses the point.

Anyway. "Where are the fossils?" They're everywhere. We have literally millions of them, stored in every museum, either on display or in racks of drawers.

"Why are there distinct kinds of animals?" The simple answer is, there's not. Species don't exist in isolation, we see species exist as a blend as we go along the tree of life. In the case of ring species, we can see this geographically, rather than temporally. E. eschscholtzii are salamanders that live around a mountain, and where the 19 populations can breed with their neighbours - but the two at the far ends can't breed with each other. This is what evolution predicts, but the only explanation in Creationism is ad hoc and contrived.

We see 'transitional' species in the form of gliding snakes and squirrels - species undergoing the same process ancient reptiles did as they developed true flight. Each step being an improvement on the last, until one feature (gliding) develops into another (flight).

This all sounds great. However ancient fossils generally do not have DNA. Therefore morphological traits are all that can be used. Who gets to choose the traits that these nested hierarchies are based on? Evos do.

You evos suggest mankind is more similar to a chimp than a chimp is to an orangutan regardless of a plethora of morphological similarites that unite non human primates this is what your genomics and nested hierarchies have come up with. This flys in the face of observation and evos will never sell it to me.

Now let's take an example of just how well nested hierarchies demonstrate anything. I have been discussing Indohyus on another thread. Indohyus is a mosaic of bones that is challenged by some evo researchers such as Rose. Here is some info.

Kenneth Rose, a professor of functional anatomy and evolution at Johns Hopkins University, said Thewissen didn't provide enough evidence to merit his conclusions. He also questioned the use of the composite skeleton.
The ear bone thickness, the key trait that Thewissen used, was difficult to judge and seemed based on a single specimen, Rose said. Much of the work is based on teeth, and overall the remains preserved from this family of species are poorly preserved, he said.
http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb/lessons/wh.indohyus.pdf​

But "I do not believe the evidence presented here demonstrates that with confidence," he said in an email. "It is an interesting hypothesis to be tested as more complete [Indohyus] fossils are discovered."
Whales Evolved From Tiny Deerlike Mammals, Study Says


So here we have a supposed whale ancestor, indohyus. Which suite of traits or dna marker do you look to to get Indohyus into a nested hierarchy with anything given Indohyus is a mosaic of pieces washed into a river bed, challenged by evo researchers, and really could be anything?

The same goes for archaeopteryx that was the intermediate that has been knocked off its perch with the discovery of modern bird footprints dated to 212 mya and predating arch by some 80 million years.

Do please explain to the forum how these nested hierarchies of yours demonstrate conclusively that Indohyus is a whale or that arch should stay nested as it was previously?

Is it not so that nested hierarchies take an assumption and then look for the markers that will give the result that is required? Is it not so that nested hierarchies are useless in identifying ancestral species within the fossil record?

Here is some info from an ID site.

There are many other interesting little problems concerning commonly used phylogenic tracing genes and proteins. For example, mammalian and amphibian "luteinizing hormone – releasing hormone" (LHRH) is identical. However, birds, reptiles, and certain fish have a different type of LHRH. Are humans therefore more closely related to frogs than to birds? Not according to standard evolutionary phylogeny trees.
Again, the data does not match the classical theory in this particular situation.15

Calcitonin (lowers blood calcium levels in animals) is another protein commonly used to determine phylogenies. Interestingly though humans differ from pigs by 18 of 32 amino acids, but by only 15 of 32 amino acids from the salmon. Are we therefore more closely related to fish than to other mammals like the pig? 5
Cytochrome c is another famous phylogenic marker protein used to determine evolutionary relationships. There is only a single amino acid difference between human and chimp cytochrome c. Because of this, many assume that the evolutionary link is obvious. However, with many other animals, this link is not so obvious. For example, the cytochrome c protein of a turtle is closer to a bird than it is to a snake and a snake is closer to a human (14 variations) than it is to a turtle (22 variations).5 Humans and horses, both being placental mammals, are presumed to have shared a common ancestor with each other more recently than they shared a common ancestor with a kangaroo (a marsupial). So the evolutionist would expect the cytochrome c of a human to be more similar to that of a horse than to that of a kangaroo. Yet, the cytochrome c of the human varies in 12 places from that of a horse but only in 10 places from that of a kangaroo.5 Such discrepancies between traditional phylogenies and those based on cytochrome c are well known.
Genetic Phylogeny​

I suggest that nested hierarchies are concoctions and machinations of evolutionists who get to choose the suite of traits or marker they use as comparisons and invent excuses when the results are uncomfortable. When it comes to identifying fossil evidence, nested hierarchies are not worth the paper they are written on.

 

[Astridhere]

What, in your opinion, is the best evidence for Creationism? Also, say whether you're an evolutionist or a Creationist.

The best evidence for creation is that evolutionists have made such a mess out of the theory of evolution.

Evolutionists have been trying for over 150 years to get some supportive evidence for TOE and still are as far away from confirming the how, when, where or why of evolution as they were 150 years ago.

The facts that do not require huge leaps of faith and speculation is the cambrian where many kinds just appear in the fossil record with no links to previous life forms. A creative day and a big one. A huge variety of tetrapods, land animals, have been dated to 400mya, just after the Devonian as they should be, and another creative day and a big one.

The other evidence for creation is genomic. Indeed under all the rhetoric of chimp and human dna being 'the same' it is not 'the same' at all. There are huge chunks of genomic material missing, insertions, rearrangements and 'new' genes. The Y chromosome is remarkably different. 30%, and comparable to a chicken and a human at 310 million years of separation. The chimp genome is up to 10% larger and has a different surface structure. Indeed the chimp/human genomes have sufficient similarity in tiny sequence areas to denote the same designer as well as a plethora of differences to identify individual creations. I do not need to evoke homoplasy, convergent evolution or any other excuses for the data to align with my creationist paradigm.